Stephen Hawking dies aged 76

“Intelligence is the ability to adapt to change”: Stephen Hawking in March 2017Times photographer Jack Hill

Professor Stephen Hawking, the groundbreaking physicist who overcame crippling disease to become a symbol of human endurance, has died aged 76 at his home in Cambridge.

Considered one of the world’s greatest scientists, Hawking’s intellect probed the very limits of human understanding, both in the vastness of space and in the bizarre sub-molecular world of quantum theory, which he said could predict what happens at the beginning and end of time.

His work ranged from the origins of the universe, through the prospect of time travel to the mysteries of black holes. The power of his intellect contrasted cruelly with the weakness of his body, ravaged by the wasting motor neurone disease he contracted at the age of 21. He was initially given two years…